Ripple is positioning itself as a cheaper payment network, particularly for large banks and enterprises, with a much higher throughput compared to Bitcoin. CEO Brad Garlinghouse explained that Ripple could rival traditional systems such as Visa with nearly 70K transactions in just 3.7 seconds and at a lower cost than Bitcoin.
However, the token might be setting up for a reality check as some believe the price surge has been fueled by a “misunderstanding.” Critics on Bitcointalk.org reacted to the meteoric rise, pointing out that Ripple, the company, is not the same as the XRP token and its Ripple Consensus ledger.
According to Ripple, its Global Payments Steering Group (GSPG) is where “leading banks are working with Ripple to reduce the time and cost of settlement, while also enabling new types of high-volume, low-value global transactions.”
By coming together to form the GSPG, these banks are laying the foundation for a new payments network, underpinned by Ripple’s solutions and supported by rules and governance for global settlement.
In other words, new demand for the XRP token could merely be speculative at this point as banks would be able to bypass transactions on the Ripple Consensus Ledger with their own Ripple-inspired platforms.